Exec: Windows Mobile to tap Xbox, Zune, etc.

Andy Lees, Microsoft’s new Windows Mobile chief, expects the division to start working more closely with other Microsoft groups — including Xbox, Zune, Windows, Windows Live and Office — to develop new experiences on mobile phones. That’s one of the tidbits I gathered in an interview with Lees last week while working on this story for today’s newspaper. Here’s an extended version of his comments on the subject:

Look back at what Microsoft has and what we could do to help the customer in this situation. We have 300 million Windows Live users. They’re using Hotmail and instant messaging and things, and those people want to use their mobile device as a window on that. We have lots of people that play games that we provide — games on PC, games on Xbox, and there’s a whole bunch of things like that, that we can provide. A lot of people manipulate their photographs and display their photographs either via Windows Live or on Windows Vista on their PC. And they plug up cameras and different things. If we can bring those things to bear, and work together to enable these user experiences, then that really is where we can accelerate a differentiated experience. So we spend a bunch of time looking at how we can bring those things together.

Later, I pressed for more details. His response:

That’s all I’ll say, but you can easily imagine how we can take those things — music, some of the things we do with Zune; games, with what we do with Xbox and Xbox Live; things that we would do with the PC and the Web, with Windows Vista and Windows Live; what people do in business with Exchange, with Office — and how we’ll make those things really come to life on mobile devices, in the right way for a mobile device.

Of course, there’s already a Windows Mobile connection in some of those areas, such as Windows Live Hotmail and Messenger. But based on his comments, Lees seems intent on increasing those existing ties and establishing new ones with additional product groups.

His Zune reference was interesting in light of Microsoft’s “Pink and Purple” project, which reportedly involves bringing Zune functions to Microsoft’s mobile phone technology. (For background, see this earlier item by ZDNet blogger Mary Jo Foley.) Lees didn’t mention the project by name, and I wasn’t able to get anyone at Microsoft to go into any detail about it.

Lees, previously a Microsoft Server & Tools executive, was recently named the senior vice president in charge of the company’s mobile communications division, replacing Pieter Knook, who left for Vodafone.

More details about the company’s broader Windows Mobile plans could come Tuesday, when Microsoft makes its appearance at the annual CTIA Wireless convention in Las Vegas. Among other things, it’s expected to show Windows Mobile 6.1, the next update to the software.